What if 3-D Printers Came Equipped with Print Preview?

Applications engineer Katy Ashby explains that simulation has the potential to encourage growth in the additive manufacturing industry by helping companies move away from empirical testing that is both costly and time consuming.

Print preview in additive manufacturing will be available soon.

That seemingly futuristic capability has the potential to eliminate several of the challenges associated with using additive manufacturing.

An applications engineer with 3DSIM, Katy Ashby sat down with IMTSTV to discuss simulation software and how it can help advance the additive manufacturing industry. 3DSIM develops simulations specific to additive manufacturing. The company creates parameters for each machine and each material and uses those in the world’s fastest scientific simulation framework.

Simulation is ultimately the key to expanding the use of additive manufacturing, Ashby argued. Simulation software can take additive manufacturing from an empirically driven discipline that requires spending hours in front of a machine in a lab fine-tuning calculations to a simple simulation-driven solution. Ultimately, simulation can eliminate the need for extensive empirical testing that is both costly and time consuming.

In the next five years, 3DSIM plans to develop a full software suite for both scientific and machine-floor based tools for additive manufacturing. These software tools will help customers more quickly add new parts and machine to their processes. As more simulations are conducted, materials that are commonly used in the industry will be categorized, further simplifying future simulations.